


Stumbling To Conclusions

by Krasimer



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Beelzebub is a seasoned drinker, Caring Crowley (Good Omens), Confusion, Denial of Feelings, Drunken Confessions, Drunken Kissing, F/M, Feelings Realization, Gabriel is a lightweight, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Nonbinary Beelzebub (Good Omens), Other, Writer's Block, bad at feelings, working through it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-07-08 03:00:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19862398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krasimer/pseuds/Krasimer
Summary: It starts with them staring at him.Okay, maybe it doesn’t start there – maybe, to understand where it starts, we need to back up a little further.It starts with Crowley in a bathtub of holy water.It starts with Aziraphale in a column of hellfire, breathing it out like he was made for it.It starts with the trials of the traitors.It starts, funnily enough, with the intersection of Heaven and Hell.





	Stumbling To Conclusions

It starts with them staring at him.

Okay, maybe it doesn’t start there – maybe, to understand where it starts, we need to back up a little further.

It starts with Crowley in a bathtub of holy water.

It starts with Aziraphale in a column of hellfire, breathing it out like he was made for it.

It starts with the trials of the traitors.

It starts, funnily enough, with the intersection of Heaven and Hell.

Archangel Gabriel and Lord Beelzebub meet up in St James Park every two weeks, after the trials Which No One Must Speak Of Again, to discuss their agent in the world. Beelzebub will arrive, later than they agreed on by precisely three minutes, entirely to agitate Gabriel. Gabriel will have various props spread across the bench, for the exact same reason.

When Beelzebub arrives, they have to wait for him to clear the bench.

Ostensibly, the meetings are for talking about how much, exactly, Aziraphale and Crowley have ruined. By their third one, it is not about the traitors, anymore. Gabriel still makes Beelzebub wait for their seat, but they have started speaking about other things.

(“Why do they feed these things?” Gabriel flicks his fingers at the ducks, frowning.

“Humans are limited,” Beelzebub mutters, nose wrinkling, looking deep into the bag of bread they somehow ended up holding in an attempt to understand.)

There should be a word, somewhere in the English language, that allows for one to express the feelings of surprise, anger, and a willingness to have a mental breakdown at a moment’s notice while also questioning everything they know about the world.

There is not.

There is, however, probably one in German.

It would come entirely in use for Gabriel, one fine evening, when he waits for Beelzebub in the park, his scarf tucked neatly around his neck. The night air around him is chilled, after all, and if he is trying to appear human, he must do his utmost.

He has, funnily enough, come from a meeting with Aziraphale, just minutes earlier. Arrived precisely at ten after five, even with knowing that Beelzebub would not be there until thirteen after.

It would almost seem like any other day.

It would almost seem like any other day if he were to discount what is weighing on his mind.

Gabriel was, at that moment, slumped down in his seat on the bench, staring off into the distance. Over the course of several meetings with the Lord of Hell, he could conclude a couple of things. The first was that, while frightening in some measure, seeming to give them extra powers of _some_ magnitude, Aziraphale and Crowley having a bond was nearly harmless. They were still getting their work done, though they had planted a flag on the Earth and labeled it as Not For Armageddon, which had been difficult to explain to thousands of demons and angels.

The second was that, in some terrifying way, he was growing fond of the Lord of Hell.

_Fond._

Excited to see them – smiling when they arrived, even!

That had been what his meeting with Aziraphale was about, actually.

Apparently, since Arma-never-mind-all-that-then, the Principality Aziraphale and the Originator of Sin Crowley had begun a relationship. Physically and emotionally entwined themselves and refused to budge. Gabriel could very much blame them for it, but he couldn’t understand it. Somehow, thinking along those lines in the several months since the near end of the world had dragged his thoughts to Beelzebub.

(“I’ve known since he saved me an unfortunate Discorporation,” Aziraphale had said of loving a demon.

“Hm,” Gabriel had nodded, trying to put those two ideas together in a way that made sense. The only thing he could focus on was remembering how Beelzebub’s nose wrinkled when they were unsure of something.

It made it dreadfully hard to focus.)

“Gabriel,” Beelzebub arrived with as little fanfare as they always did.

They both paused, looking at the bare bench next to Gabriel. He hadn’t pulled out his usual props, the star charts and maps and sketchbooks he usually carried. Hadn’t even bothered to bring anything with him. Gabriel blinked a few times, then shifted awkwardly, gesturing at the bench in invitation.

Beelzebub sat down, turning their head to look at him.

Neither of them spoke.

His chest felt tight as he looked at them, his breath catching. There was something about the sunset light across their face, the way their eyes glimmered in the dying light. It could have been a Hellfire reflection but it _wasn’t_ and he could hardly be blamed for what he did in reaction to their presence. Their face was softer, somehow, eyes bright, and he leaned in, brushing his lips across their cheek.

They both paused.

The _world_ paused.

Like nature itself had decided to hold its breath and watch.

His eyes went wide as he leaned back, his hands curling together in his lap. Gabriel watched as Beelzebub lifted their own hand, slowly, to touch their cheek.

The purpose of their meetings was lost on him for just a moment and he felt a little of the love-longing that he supposed humanity felt.

Abruptly, pushing it away, Gabriel stood up. “I am afraid I must—” he coughed, watching the demon continue to hold their cheek, eyes wide and still reflecting the sunlight. “I need to be _elsewhere_ ,” he settled on.

With a grand total of sixteen meetings, he had _absolutely_ ruined the relations between Heaven and Hell.

Gabriel fled.

Across London:

There was a knock on the door.

“Open up, Crowley.” Beelzebub’s voice was irritated and, briefly, Crowley wished for the mister and the Holy Water once more.

When he opened the door, his boss stalked through it like it had done them a personal grievance, their eyes roving around the flat. The plants got a puzzled look as Beelzebub paused by them, then turned to Crowley. “I need a _drink_ ,” they mumbled. “And I know you would have something that would suit my purposezzz…”

Beelzebub wasn’t controlling their buzzing.

Immediately, Crowley could sense that it was going to be a dreadfully long night. “I can get you that,” he followed in their wake, watching as they made a direct path for a chair at his table. “Lord—”

“ _Shut up._ ” Beelzebub dropped into a chair, a hand brushing over their cheek.

“Right,” Crowley nodded. “Uh.”

He glanced around, almost certain there would be another demon standing there, watching him, ready to get revenge for whatever he’d messed up. He would not have put it past Hell to get the idea, seven and a half months later, to finally try to take actions against him again. Hastur in particular, he was certain, would have delighted in it.

Not knowing what else to do, he grabbed a couple of glasses and a bottle of scotch.

“Will this work?” he settled into another chair, offering it forward.

“Will it get me drunk?” Beelzebub was staring off into the distance, still holding their cheek.

“It…Should.”

“Then it will work.”

They sat there for some time, Crowley occasionally pouring out another drink for his boss and trying not to vibrate out of his skin with anxiety. He didn’t know why the Lord of Hell was in his flat and Beelzebub was not, apparently, going to offer up any answers in that regard unless he pushed. Which was, unsurprisingly, almost the last thing he wanted to do.

Unfortunately, after an hour or so, curiosity got the better of him and he had to ask.

Beelzebub stared into the bottom of their glass and frowned, eyes narrowed. “It’zzz _empty_ ,” they muttered.

“That’s cause you drank it,” Crowley offered the bottle up again, an eyebrow raised as his boss nodded slowly. “Lord Beelzebub?” he waited until their eyes were on him. “It’s only – why are you _here?_ ”

“Hm.” Beelzebub tilted their glass, watching as Crowley refilled it.

The silence grew, filling the room, until Beelzebub sighed. “How did you do it?”

Visions of switching bodies with Aziraphale filled his mind as Crowley watched Beelzebub take another sip of their drink. “Uh.” Crowley refilled his own glass, trying to put some breathing room between himself and the question. “Well,” he heaved his next breath out like an anchor tied around his neck, hoping the pauses he was giving were going to be enough to help him think of an _extremely_ good lie.

Beelzebub, however, steamrolled over his thoughts with their next words, cutting off the lie before he could even think of it.

“You caught an _angel_ ,” Beelzebub gestured, frustrated at something, towards the table, waving at something vaguely. “And made it _work_. Between the two of you. In a.” They made a face, their nose wrinkling. “A relationship. A partnership.” Their eyes were on Crowley again. “ _Love._ ”

Crowley’s mind, much like a computer faced with an eager Newton Pulsifer, had quite shut down at that point.

“It’zzz _infuriating_ ,” Beelzebub gestured again, sloshing their drink in the glass. A couple of drops splattered across the back of their hand and they glared at the liquid until it was just gone. “Feeling like _thizzz!”_

Forget shut down, his mind was _obliterated_ at this point.

His boss was in his flat, sloshed out of their mind in such a human way, complaining about _what sounded like their love life._

Crowley hedged his bets and nodded. “It is, yeah. I mean…” he shrugged a shoulder, the words not coming as smoothly as he needed them to. He ended up humming quietly, pursing his lips together. He needed to not mention that the Garden was where he had fallen in love with Aziraphale – that the moment an angel had rebelled by doing what he thought was the only good and just option had been when Crowley had fallen in love was something he could _not bring up to Lord Beelzebub._

He had been in love for longer than there had been a wheel.

That was not the sort of thing one could bring up, comfortably, to the Lord of Hell who had nearly killed him for consorting with an angel.

Something occurred to him.

“Hang on, who are you in love with?”

Beelzebub’s eyes were on him again, narrowed and glinting with something that put an amount of fear into him. He had to proceed very carefully, lest Beelzebub decide that talking to him was the lesser option between that and attacking him in some way.

The answer, when it came, nearly blanked out his mind.

“Gabriel.” He parroted, one hand clenching the back of his chair. The other was wrapped around his own glass again. “As in, the Archangel Gabriel – that’s who you’re here drinking with me over?”

Beelzebub glanced down at the glass in their hand. “Izzn’t thizz what humanzz do?” they muttered. Their cheeks were reddened, drunk enough to be almost amusing. His boss was an emotional wreck and was shaping up to be a weepy drunk. “Drink away their sorrowzzz?” they set the glass on the table and dropped their head into their hands.

In the background, the phone rang.

Crowley had half a mind to ignore it.

He also had half a mind to jump into it and escape the Very Awkward Situation which was playing itself out in his flat.

“Be back in a tick,” he stood up slowly. Beelzebub didn’t move, didn’t so much as acknowledge him slipping away. He caught the phone on the third ring, feeling like someone had moved the foundations of the world out from underneath him. “Hello?”

“Crowley!” Aziraphale’s voice was a welcome distraction. “Goodness, am I glad I caught you at home—”

“Yeah, Angel, this isn’t the best time—”

“—It’s only that I have something of a situation here and I was wondering if, perhaps, you might have some words of advice you could give me?”

“Angel?” Crowley felt a shot of cold dread chasing off the slight drunken state he had found himself in. “Angel, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, terribly, it’s just…Well,” he could _hear_ Aziraphale shrugging. “Gabriel is currently laid out on my sofa. It seems that imbibing for the first time has left him quite wrong-footed. He came in and started asking me questions about our relationship, about how we got together.” Only Aziraphale could sound so pleased while in the middle of a panic, Crowley would swear to it. “He has, it seems, gotten fairly drunk and – Oh dear, he seems to be crying now. Crowley, I have no idea what to do.”

“…Is he panicking about Beelzebub?”

He could see his boss’s shoulders tensing up when they heard their name, but Beelzebub made no other motions towards standing up or trying to hurt him, so he seemed to be in the clear for the moment.

“Yes, however did you know?”

“Yeah,” Crowley sighed. “I happen to have a situation of my own to handle, Angel. If it’s alright with you, we’ll be there in just a few.”

“Oh.” Crowley could practically see the look of surprise on Aziraphale’s face. “Yes, do come over. Bring them with you.” A pause, the small smile he knew Aziraphale wore whenever he said the words. “I love you, my dear.”

“Love you too, Angel.” Crowley, as always, felt the words sticking in his throat somewhat. Six thousand years of keeping it a secret would do that to anyone, he thought.

He ended the call.

“Alright, so,” he sauntered back over to Beelzebub, bracing his hands on the table. “Who’s up for a car ride? We’re going somewhere.”

“I’m not _moving._ ” Beelzebub had their forehead directly on the table now, their hands curled in their hair.

“Yes you are – another human tradition, time for you to learn some more of them. We’re going to go to another place to drink our sorrows away. It’s called a pub crawl – fun, if you know what you’re doing.” Crowley pulled his jacket on, gesturing towards the door when Beelzebub turned their head to look at him. “C’mon,” he grinned, throwing his panic out the window in favor of just about any other emotion. He’d even take insanity, if it came to that. “You can miracle yourself sober later. Time for a rather human experience.”

Beelzebub stood up slowly, perhaps in an attempt to look intimidating – it was unfortunate that they just looked distraught.

And very drunk.

“That’s the spirit,” Crowley waved for them to follow.

Astoundingly, they actually did.

About An Hour Earlier:

Having seen Gabriel out the door only a little while earlier, Aziraphale had not been prepared to see his boss for quite some time.

However, twenty-eight minutes after he had walked out the door the first time, Gabriel had come stumbling back through it, paying absolutely no mind to the ‘closed’ sign. The Archangel had simply stormed through the shop until he’d found Aziraphale in the back room. “I need to speak with you about something of some importance,” Gabriel had dropped down onto the sofa, cradling his head in his hands.

Aziraphale, having just seconds to respond to the other angel not only being back in his shop but in his private quarters, blinked a couple of times. “Pardon me?”

“I need to speak with you,” Gabriel lifted his head up for a moment, eyes still pinned on his hands. “About something of some importance.” His eyes were wide, almost wild, and he was trembling. “I need to know how you fell in love with Crowley – how it _happened_ , why it happened, what _caused it_ , and I need to know _now._ ” He looked up when Aziraphale stepped closer, finally actually looking at him. “I may have just _fucked_ the relations between Heaven and Hell and I need to know how and why and what to do about it.”

“…Stay here a moment,” Aziraphale detoured to the shelves, retrieving a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses. He had been planning on opening the bottle anyway, drinking some while listening to music and planning out how to add more room to the shop without it seeming impossible to the humans.

From the panic in Gabriel’s entire form, he could tell that his nightly plans would have to be put off. He’d had no plans to go and visit Crowley until much later in the evening, spending the night curled around him in his bed. True to his serpent nature, Crowley did not retain all that much body heat and the two of them quite enjoyed cuddling together. Neither of them needed sleep, but it was so nice to sleep in the same bed as someone you had loved for so long.

He poured a glass of wine for Gabriel, settling it in his hand.

“…What is this?” Gabriel looked up at him, frowning suspiciously at the red liquid.

“It is wine, you drink it,” Aziraphale poured his own glass and settled into his armchair. “I find it helps to have something to drink while you’re talking with someone about something like this.”

“My body is—”

“I know,” Aziraphale kept it to himself that he mostly wanted Gabriel to shut up for a moment. He needed that moment to think about how he was going to answer his questions. He really was no good at lying, though he did not think that this required that particular skill. “But you seem stressed and this is, in fact, something humans do.”

Their earlier conversations had been about acclimating to humanity, to learning how to pass among them unseen and know more about them. Earlier, Gabriel had shown some confusion for why Aziraphale and Crowley had been so adamant about saving the Earth. Teaching him some of the finer points of interacting with the people of the planet had been a good way for Aziraphale to explain it to him, in some respects.

Though he did rather suspect that Crowley’s hand in things would be necessary, if Gabriel showed a tendency towards Bebop.

And so, though they did not know it at the time, their evening progressed in much the same way as it did in Crowley’s flat, across town. As we have already seen, Crowley and Aziraphale have a short conversation on the phone, concerning an angel and a demon who are not them, while Gabriel has alcohol for the first time and Beelzebub sulks.

By the time Crowley and Beelzebub walk through the door, the Lord of Hell trailing sullenly behind Crowley, Aziraphale was wishing he’d had the foresight to get Gabriel out of his shop.

The Archangel was splashed out across the sofa, a hand to his forehead, moaning quietly about how unfair it was.

In the time since hanging up his call to Crowley, Aziraphale had heard, _several times_ , about how adorable Beelzebub’s nose was, how their eyes shined in the right light, and how much Gabriel thought he might like to kiss them. He had also heard about how Beelzebub was likely to want to kill Gabriel if they found out about the angel’s thoughts.

Gabriel hadn’t even noticed the phone call to Crowley.

From the door, Crowley crossed the room to press his forehead against Aziraphale’s, Beelzebub following in his wake. “I am never letting this happen again,” he muttered, his glasses slipping down his nose.

“I’ve been here, listening to Gabriel,” Aziraphale murmured. “Believe me, I will help in that regard.”

Beelzebub looked at them, swaying on their feet, eyes narrowed. They opened their mouth, ready to say something or perhaps just condemn them both to Discorporation and death, when they spotted Gabriel. The angel was flat on his back, his wine glass on the small table Aziraphale had miracled up for that exact purpose, his arm thrown over his eyes. Beelzebub moved closer to him, their eyes focused on him. “You run away too fast,” they hissed the words out. “It’zzz not _fair_ ,” they shoved Gabriel back down to the sofa before he could make more than a small motion towards standing up, slapping his arm away before immediately settling themself over him like an overlarge cat.

Gabriel stared down at the top of their head like he was puzzled by their existence before he nodded.

“ _Hold me,_ ” Beelzebub demanded. One of their knees was pressed at an awkward angle into the side of the sofa, the furniture too small to fully hold the both of them, but that didn’t seem to be stopping the Lord of Hell. “You’ve already taken libertiezzz, you might azzz well take the rezzzt.” They nudged their head under Gabriel’s chin, one arm sliding underneath him and holding onto him.

Slowly, almost glacially slow, Gabriel brought an arm up, resting it firmly over Beelzebub’s waist. His other arm was brought up, his hand curling in the demon’s hair.

“Well,” Aziraphale nodded. “I think it’s best to leave them to it.”

“Angel,” Crowley snorted. “They’re both drunk out of their minds. And – trust me, the knowledge that the Archangel Gabriel is a lightweight will be my favorite bit of information for _years_ – they need to actually speak about why they’re both _drunk._ And currently sitting on your sofa.”

“And talking about it can happen in the morning,” Aziraphale sighed. “After they’ve woken up together and have no avenue of escape from the conversation that must be had.”

“…Just enough of a bastard to be worth liking,” Crowley grinned. 

In The Morning:

Most mornings, for a new couple who got together the night before, go something like this:

Wake up together, bashful and smiling, holding on to someone you managed to find against all odds. Sometimes just in the same bed, or even just in the same house after a party got a little wild.

The morning after Beelzebub and Gabriel both got drunk and realized they had been dating went something like this:

Gabriel woke up first, his mouth feeling like it had dried out overnight. His hair was mussed and no amount of fixing would get it to look right unless he conjured up a small miracle. He would not know this until some time later, however, because he woke up to a fairly decent weight pinning him down to a couch that he only recognized as Aziraphale’s after some time spent staring at in and not knowing what else to do.

The Lord of Hell was still asleep on his chest, their hands clenched almost threateningly in the fabric of his clothing. If he moved too much, his jacket and scarf might tear.

And he could always miracle away the holes, but he would forever know they had been there.

He could remember everything that had happened the night before, including when Beelzebub had shown up in Aziraphale’s shop and sat down upon him. They had, at some point, had a blanket tossed over the both of them.

His hand was still on Beelzebub’s back, holding them close.

He had to admit, it was…Nice. Holding onto them.

“You’re thinking too much,” Beelzebub’s voice was softer than he had ever heard, their right hand loosening from his scarf and trailing through his hair. “Now that I have you here,” they lifted their head up to meet his eyes. “Explain.”

“…Well,” Gabriel paused to reach out and grab a glass of water that had been left on the small table next to the sofa. Beelzebub moved with him, allowing him to move but making sure he knew he wasn’t going anywhere without an explanation. They wrapped their legs around him when he fully sat up, still sitting in his lap. Like this, sleep-rumpled and so close, he thought he could see a softer side of them. “I just…Thought how nice it would be to kiss you.”

“You _didn’t_ kiss me.”

“…I…Didn’t?” Gabriel frowned. He and Aziraphale had been speaking about humanity before that, had talked about the various ways humans showed affection and why they ate what they did. He had still been curious about the sushi.

“That,” Beelzebub scoffed. “ _Wasn’t_ a kiss.”

They pulled the glass of water out of his hand and set it back on the table. “This,” they cupped his face in their hands, brushing their noses together. “Is a _kiss.”_

Their mouths met and, at first, Gabriel couldn’t see the point of it. It was just one more way for humanity to smear parts of themselves together. When Beelzebub pressed a little closer, tilted their head and rolled their hips, it was like an electric shock went coursing through him. They bit gently at his bottom lip, drawing back.

“What you did before, that was a _peck_ on the _cheek_ ,” Beelzebub rolled their eyes. “Part of why I went off and drank with Crowley was because it is _very_ confusing to have that happen when you’re feeling like you might want to kiss someone. To follow that, you _ran off_.” Their thumb traced small circles over his throat before their hand slid to the back of his neck. “Kindly engage your brain, you feathered idiot, before you do something like that again.”

“You looked lovely in the sunset,” Gabriel met their eyes. “Like you were glowing.”

Smiling, Beelzebub leaned in again, kissing him once more, before they leaned back and flipped the ends of his scarf into his face. “You have a lot to learn,” they shook their head. “On our next date, I expect dinner.”

**Author's Note:**

> Either I write Serious for these two or I write Goofy. Apparently, there is no in-between.


End file.
